Battle of Kismayo (2008)

Battle of Kismayo
Part of the War in Somalia
Date August 20 – 22 2008 Location Kismayo, Somalia Result Al-Shabaab victory
Belligerents
al-Shabaab	Marehan pro-government militias
Commanders and leaders
Unknown	Barre Adan Shire Hiiraale
Casualties and losses
70 killed

Battle of Kismayo began on on August 20 2008 when Islamist al-Shabaab fighters began an offensive to conquer the Southern Somali port of Kismayo from pro-government militias. Three days of fighting reportedly killed 70 people and injured 100 more. Al-Shabaab took the town on August 22.

Marehan clan militias – led by warlord-turned-parliamentarian Barre Hirale – had reportedly suffered heavy losses and that Hirale’s personal car was seized by Islamist fighters.

Background

Al-Shabab, fighting as part of the Islamic Courts Union, was driven out of Kismayu in early 2007 after Ethiopian forces rolled into Somalia to back the interim government in the fight to take control of much of central and southern Somalia. Interim Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf long maintained that Kismayo was since then not in the hands of the Ethiopian-backed transitional government. There are no Ethiopian forces present in Kismayo and the Jubba regions as a whole, although clan militias there claim they are part of the government. Kismayu had been relatively peaceful in recent months compared with the bombed-out capital Mogadishu.